Biography – A Tribute.pdf - Garuda

Tribute to
Late Dr. Vijayaraghavan Sundararajan
January 04, 1960 - May 17, 2011

Childhood and Early Life
Second youngest son of Mr. Vijayaraghavan and Ms. Vedavalli
Six siblings (4 brothers and 2 sisters)
Married to Ms. S. Srilatha in 1990, a Carnatic vocalist and currently with C-DAC
Two beautiful children - Madhuvanthi (B.Sc Part II) and Naren (XI)
Education
1989 Ph.D. in Physics, Anna University, Madras, India
Thesis on Electron momentum distribution in some
transition metals
Ph.D supervisor: Prof. Ashok Mani.
1982 M.Sc. Physics, Presidency College, Madras
University, India
1980 B.Sc. Physics, Presidency college, Madras University, India
School:
Ram Krishana Mission Higher Secondary Boy’s
School, Chennai

Professional Experience
1) 1994 April till May 2011:
Member Technical Staff,
Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC),
Pune University Campus, Pune.
Designation: Associate Director and Head, Computer Aided Engineering and Image
Processing Group
Major responsibilities
1) Coordinating the development of scientific and engineering applications on PARAM
as well as Grid Computing.
2) Teaching various courses in C-DAC, Pune University and IISER, Pune.
3) Ph.D thesis supervisor.
2. 2001 Aug - 2002 Oct: Guest Scientist, Intelligent Bioinformatics Systems Group,
German Cancer Research Centre (DKFZ)
3. 2000 Nov - 2001 March: Visiting Associate Professor, Institute for Materials Research,
Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan
4. 1990-92,93-94 March: Lecturer, Department of Physics, University of Pune
5. 1992-93: Visiting Scientist, International Centre for Theoretical Physics, Trieste, Italy.
6. 1988-90: Principal Project Associate, under DST & C-DAC Projects at Physics
Department, University of Pune
7. 1986-88: CSIR Senior Research Fellowship
8. 1983-86: Teaching Research Fellowship, Anna University, Chennai.

Teaching & Research Experience
1) More than 20 years of teaching experience in various subjects like: Evolutionary
Computing, Modelling and Simulations, Computer Applications in Physics (Monte Carlo
and Molecular Dynamics), Software Engineering, Parallel Processing, Quantum
Mechanics, Group Theory, Numerical Methods and Programming.
2) Published about 50 papers in International Journals, International Conference
Proceedings and Edited Books.
3) Most significant work: Finding the novel structure of Cd 13 Se 13 and Cd 34 Se 34
(Sundararajan, Kumar, Belosludov, Kawazoe and group of Kasuya,
Nature Materials 3, 99 (2004)
Ph.D theses Guidance:
1) Nanocluster Simulations and optical properties (Physics; on-going)
2) GA and Fuzzy logic based decision support system for clinical diagnosis (Scientific
Computing; 2010)
3) Applying Intrusion detection system for denial of service attack (computer Science;2010)
4) Evolving optimal solutions by Nature inspired algorithms (Computer Science; ongoing)
5) Genetic Algorithms applied to Multiprocess Scheduling (computer Science; 2000)
6) Multiple Sequence Alignment using Paralle Genetic Algorithms (Mathematics; 1999)
7) Device Simulation on a Parallel Machine (Physics; 1998)

Professional Affiliations
1) Member of Project Advisory Committee for Electrical, Electronics and Computer
Engineering, DST since May 2007 onwards.
2) Member of the Academic Council, Scientific Computing, University of Pune
(2006-08)
3) Member of the Departmental Research Committee, Computer Science and
Engineering, National Institute of Technology, Surathkal, Karnataka (2004-06)
4) Member, Advisory Council, Indian Association of Physics Teachers. (2000-01)
5) Member, Technical Committee for the course on Diploma in Scientific
Computing, Pune (1999-2000)
6) Member, Advisory Committee, Institute for Information Technology, Bharathiya
Vidya Bahvan, Pune (1999-2000)
7) Recognized as a guide by University of Pune for Ph.D. students in Computer
Science, Physics and Scientific Computing
(Probably the only person to guide in three different disciplines simultaneously).
8) Reviewer of International conference papers in Genetic Algorithms and
Computer Aided Engineering.
9) Life member, Indian Physics Association
10) Life member, Indian Physical Society
11) Life member, Indian Association of Physics Teachers

Significant Research Achievement: Nano-Cluster Simulations.
Cd 13 Se 13 Cd 34 Se 34
Unlike C and BN, II-VI compound semiconductors have 3D structures
Sundararajan, Kumar, Belosludov, Kawazoe and group of Kasuya,
Nature Materials 3, 99 (2004)

A Scientists at heart…
A High Performance computing Expert…
A Grid Computing Expert…
A Humble administrator…
A Soft spoken person always and a concerned Boss..
A Guide to many…A shoulder to pacify you, if you are in Grief…
A very-very dependable persons to all….
A Heart of Gold, Soul so enlighten and a Brain so sharp…
He was like words of Wisdom…
A face so smiling , a patience of Rock and an attitude of a saint…
A friend to all and Guru in all aspect of life…
A rare human being which can qualify to be a man from God’s
own land…

Indo-Russian Workshop Nov 2009 at Moscow.

Russia visit at Moscow

Mrs. Srilatha Sundararajan

Dr Sundar with Srilatha at CDAC’’s Monsoon trip at Kass lake July 2009

Naren, Srilatha, Sundararajan and Madhu in Monsoon trip at Kass lake July 2009

Condolence message from his colleagues, friends, students
This is really shocking news to me. Dr. Sundarajan will be in my prayer. He was
guru and good friend of mine. We will miss our guide. I first met him during my
Ph. D. program. We were working on Genetic Algorithm and Crystal Structure at
Pune University, Physics Dept. We enjoyed full two years of hard work and very
healthy cheerful years. I was especially impressed by his friendly and cooperative
nature, soft spoken, down to earth. I never ever seen him mad at someone. I
remember his glinting smile. Ohh man, it is very hard to accept the fact! He is not
among us now.
-Padmakar Bhosale,former colleague at Pune University.
To me, Dr. Sundararajan was an 'un-official' mentor during my Ph.D. program.
Although I had quite less academic overlap with him, he always used to help out
in umpteen ways, particularly when it came to using the C-DAC facilities for our
research work. He almost always used to attend my Ph.D. progress presentations
and had ready useful comments at the end of the session. Even when Dr.
Sundararajan went into higher administrative roles at C-DAC he was always
accessible to everyone who had an interest in doing interesting work with HPC
and evolutionary algorithms. He also taught courses at my alma mater, and would
indeed be a great loss as a teacher
- Dr. V. Ganesh, Australian National University, former student.

He was a dear friend and colleague. On several occasions we discussed
professional issues including parallel computing, GA. We were also social friends
and our families interacted as well. We have lost a great scientist as
well as a great human being.
-Prof. Sanjay Mittal, IIT Kanpur.
It is truly shocking to hear this news.
-Prof. Umesh Waghmare, JNCASR, Bangalore.
We are very shocked to learn about untimely death of Sunder.
I remembered all my meetings with him. He was very approachable
-Dr Rajendra Zope, University of Texas, Al Paso.
I am shocked beyond words to hear about the sad demise of our very good friend,
and a fine human being, Sunderarajan. It is a very saddening and very disturbing news.
I am very sorry for his family and his academic group. it is a very disquieting thought
that he is not with us anymore, and life could be that very transient.
-Prof. V S S S Sastry, University of Hyderabad.
I am indeed spellbound to hear this sad news. I knew him for the past 15 years.
He was a rare human being in todays world.
-Dr Chiranjib Majumder, BARC, Mumbai.

I am very sorry to hear this sad news.
-Prof D D Sarma, IISc, Bangalore.
This news is too shocking for words. I had known him since 1999 and my respect
for him over the years had grown. His help during the initial stages of our coupledcluster
computations was crucial. As you know he continued taking an interest in all
aspects of our computational research including our recent work on DMRG. The
best tribute we can pay to his memory would be to follow the example he has set
for all us as a scientist and an human being.
-Prof. B. P. Das, IIAP, Bangalore.

two minutes
of silence…

I am very sorry to hear this sad news.
-Prof D D Sarma, IISc, Bangalore.
This news is too shocking for words. I had known him since 1999 and my respect
for him over the years had grown. His help during the initial stages of our coupledcluster
computations was crucial. As you know he continued taking an interest in all
aspects of our computational research including our recent work on DMRG. The
best tribute we can pay to his memory would be to follow the example he has set
for all us as a scientist and an human being.
-Prof. B. P. Das, IIAP, Bangalore.